


i think this is how love goes, check yes or no

by kayyyy31



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: F/M, Jake and Amy fluff, Peraltiago, Sorry Not Sorry, idk how i got this, opps, pure fluff, set in between s05e02 and s05e03, this started off as jake leaves amy notes on her computer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-11
Updated: 2017-10-11
Packaged: 2019-01-15 23:11:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12330726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kayyyy31/pseuds/kayyyy31
Summary: “Where’s the fire, Ames?” Jake asked with that smug grin of his.  Usually Amy wanted to smack that grin off of him, but today she couldn’t bring herself to feel anything other than adoration for the man in front of her.“I needed a second to process everything.  A secret admirer left me some notes, I was coming up here to brainstorm who they could be from.”





	i think this is how love goes, check yes or no

If waking up next to Jake every morning for the last week was amazing, getting to go to work with him for the first time since he was released from jail was heaven on earth.

While he was gone, she was so pointedly aware of how long the walk from the garage to the precinct was. It was glaringly obvious just how alone she was whenever Taylor Swift would come on or she said something that was a perfect setup for one of his dumb jokes and she’d look up to find an empty desk. It was shocking how cold her hand could get from the 2 minute walk at the end of the day without the warmth his always provided her’s.

It’s so so unbelievably easy for Amy to wake up the morning of his first day back. She doesn’t even need the promise of three cups of coffee to get her out of bed, the cold tile doesn’t bother her as she brushes her teeth. How can she focus on how cold her little toe is when her elbow keeps bumping into Jake’s and when his gaze is warms her better than her heaviest winter coat ever could?

Most mornings in the Santiago-Peralta apartment passed with both residents running on autopilot. If you ask Amy what she and Jake did on any given morning, she wouldn’t be able to tell you more than the fact that she and her boyfriend both woke up, drowned themselves in coffee, and somehow made it to work on time.

This morning was not one of those. Both Jake and Amy were critically aware of how special it was to be getting ready for work together again. Jake spent so many mornings in jail just staring at the wall, thinking about what how Amy was getting ready for work without him, how her life was going on while his stayed stagnant. Thinking back to those dark times in the dark rooms made the victory of going back to work so much sweeter.

The two walked hand and hand to Amy’s car; Amy relishing having him sitting in her passenger seat again. She would never admit it to him if he asked, but she missed the way he refused to listen to a song all the way through, how his hands would never stay off the radio dial for too long. More than anything, she missed how comfortable they were together, how even when the only noise in the car came from the speakers, it never felt awkward.

Jake was fumbling with his badge the whole 5 mile drive to work, which made it so hard for Amy to keep her eyes on the road. How was she supposed to focus on the what was going on outside of the car when her boyfriend was being so heartbreakingly vulnerable in the next seat. He looked like a little kid who had to watch all of his older brothers and sisters go to school everyday that finally got to go to kindergarten himself. It took everything in her to not reach over and squeeze his cheek.

When they finally got to the precinct (Jake is positive she took the long way to work on purpose), Jake all but skipped all the way up to the fourth floor, taking the stairs two at a time in his haste to finally be a cop again.

All Amy could do was shake her head at the perpetual five year old she was madly in love with. 

She couldn’t suppress the grin that spread across her face like wildfire every time she glanced up from the paperwork she was working on only to see Jake staring back at her. She hadn’t felt this content in a long long time.

The easiness of her smile completely changed when Holt called her and Boyle into his office. She had gotten used to working cases with him while Jake was away (she still couldn’t bring herself to even think the p-word) but now that he was back at work full time, she assumed things would finally go back to the way they were before; Jake and Amy, partners in the streets and in the sheets.

“Detectives, we have been given time sensitive information about the open case that Santiago was assigned this morning. I suggest you both follow up on it,” Holt said.

“Captain, with all due respect, Ja- I mean Detective Peralta and I have been partners for so long. I just thought that since he’s back..”

“Detective Santiago, I understand your reasons for assuming that you would be partnered with Detective Peralta again, but Peralta is not cleared to be back in the field yet. I suggest you and Boyle investigate this lead as soon as possible. Dismissed.”

“Yes sir,” Amy mumbled under her breath. Just like that, the wind was knocked out from her lungs and the light air that had surrounded her thus far that day dissipated at once.

Amy slunk out of Holt’s office, and before she could take two steps towards the elevator, Jake’s strong arms are around her and her head is buried deep into her neck. 

“Ames, babe, what’s wrong. Are you okay? Is the precinct okay? Whatever it is, I promise that you’re going to be okay. Just breathe, babe. Okay?”

“I’m okay, Jake. Holt just asked Boyle and I to follow up on a lead and it’s bumming me out a little. I just assumed that since you’re back, we’d work cases together again and finally get our lives back to what they were before. I just, I miss the way things were before.”

“Babe, I promise you I will pass the psych eval as soon as possible and we can get everything back to normal. But Holt is staring at us right now so I think it’s best you leave before you embarrass yourself in front of him again.”

Amy sent him off with a slap on the shoulder before begrudgingly following Charles out of the bullpen. She began noticing in the last week that it didn’t matter how far away she was from Jake, if he was out of her line of vision, he was too far away from her. It didn’t matter if he was on the other side of the couch or on the other side of the borough, if she couldn’t hold him and make him feel safe then she felt like she wasn’t doing enough to help him.

Being away from the precinct on Jake’s first day back almost felt like she was transported back in time to when everything was wrong. Since he had gotten home (Amy considers that to be when he pinned her against the door as it was closing and kissed like he was making up for lost time; Jake considers that to be the second he saw her in the prison waiting room when he was released) they hadn’t spent more than 5 minutes apart. Being away from him to work a case, something she knows he so desperately wants to do again, hurts her barely begun to heal heart.

She knows that if Jake pulled some of the stunts she pulled to try and make the outing shorter she’d kill him, but that doesn’t stop her from rushing through the crime scene and taking barely legible notes in order to get back to the precinct sooner. If Boyle notices something is off with Amy (which he totally does, because she’s Amy Santiago and she never cuts corners nor does she ever leave a stone unturned) he doesn’t say anything, and she can tell he’s rushing a little bit too to get back to his best friend. Jake being gone was hard for everyone, and Amy has to keep reminding herself she wasn’t the only one struggling.

By the time they get back to the precinct it feels like an eternity and a half has gone by, when it reality it’s been a little over an hour. One of the two has a detailed list of everything they found that could help their case, while Amy has a list of things she plans on saying to Jake when she sees him again.

(She can’t help that she’s babying him and scared to be away from him for so long. She can’t help it that the maternal instincts she swore she never had are kicking in at the sight of him. She can’t stop the feeling she gets in her chest when she sees him that tell her he needs her to protect him.)

She practically trips over the chair next to his desk in her haste to throw her arms around his shoulders, but all she sees when she finally regains her balance is an empty chair and a computer that has only the slightest trace of heat radiating off of it. 

As soon as his name left her lips, she noticed a post-it in the middle of her computer screen, and she knew there was only one person in the world who would think that getting post-it residue in the center of her monitor would be a funny way to rile her up.

The second time she said his name was much more disgruntled, much more reminiscent of the days before Jake was behind bars. Rushing around to her chair, she saw there were in fact 2 post-its and she felt the anger dissipate almost immediately.

On the sticky notes in the middle of her computer monitor, Jake had written five of the sweetest words in the english language. The top note contained the words “you’re beautiful” in Jake’s signature chicken scratch and the bottom simply said “I love you.”  
Amy felt the blood rush straight to her cheeks as she cast her gaze down towards her desk to minimize the relentless teasing she knew would follow from her coworkers. It was then when she saw one of her special index cards (the colorful ones she saved for important reminders and notes to Captain Holt) misplaced and defaced.

“Ames, you are the most kickass detective I know. It is just the best thing ever to be able to work with you every day. I promise I’m doing everything I can to get back in the field so that we can kick ass together again. I love you. J” 

Amy couldn’t flee the bullpen fast enough. She knew that if her coworkers saw her crying, both her and Jake would never be free from the torment their fellow detectives would cast upon them. 

She kept her head down sprinted towards the evidence lockup, desperate to have a moment to calm herself down before facing her friends again. Right as her hand was reaching out to grab the door handle, she felt the top of her head collide with Jake’s shoulders.

“Where’s the fire, Ames?” Jake asked with that smug grin of his. Usually Amy wanted to smack that grin off of him, but today she couldn’t bring herself to feel anything other than adoration for the man in front of her.

“I needed a second to process everything. A secret admirer left me some notes, I was coming up here to brainstorm who they could be from.”

“Well aren’t you a barrel of laughs today, Ms. Santiago?”

“I learned everything I know from the wrapper of the Laffy Taffy that my immature boyfriend insisted on bringing to bed last night.”

“I’m insulted that you think the Laffy Taffy wrapper is funnier than me, babe. But really, what were you running from?” Jake didn’t even try to hide the concern that was so apparent on his face.

“Nothing, I promise. I just saw the notes and needed a second to think about how lucky I am. I know I was only gone for like an hour today, but it felt like so much longer. I’m so thankful that you’re finally home and we can finally start to move on with our lives. The notes just made me remember how special you are and how thankful I am that you’re my best friend.”

Jake found it impossible to stop himself from leaning in and meeting her in the middle, “I promise you that for as long as I live, I will keep reminding you how amazing you are.”

\--------------------------

From then on, Amy walked into the precinct everyday to a new note on her computer screen with a sweet message from Jake. She began collecting them and reading them over and over on her worst days.

She keeps the one he left for her on their wedding day in a frame next to their bed and reads it every morning when she wakes up and every night before she goes to sleep. Their kids have it memorized, as Amy elected to read them the note over the traditional fairy tales.

(The Santiago-Peralta kids like the real fairy tale better, anyway.)

**Author's Note:**

> come find me on tumblr at okayokaycoolcoolcool !


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